Is it “your” rail network? The Auckland rail tracks and stations are being upgraded at present and, due to disruptions, a special timetable has been issued. On the front of this is written “Buses replacing trains while we improve your rail network”. That’s the socialist lie, here comes the libertarian truth…

If a piece of land belongs to you then you should be able to do whatever you like on that land, if that activity does not violate the personal and/or property rights of another person (that’s the ideal, but we live in a socialist state so your property rights are annihilated by the government). If the rail network – the tracks and the associated land – was “your[s]” then you would be free to walk over it, just as you are free to walk over land that you own. But you are not free to walk over the rail network, and if you do you will be fined up to $10,000 plus any amount of compensation that the judge decides you should pay [1]. This shows that it is not “your” rail network, for no sane person would fine you for walking across land that is yours.

If the rail network is not yours then who does it belong to? It belongs to the state, which controls every detail of what happens on that land. Section 50 of the Railways Act proves my point: it says that the Minister responsible may

(a) set out standards and requirements relating to the behaviour of individuals on railways or railway premises, including, without limitation, standards and requirements concerning the conduct of rail personnel, passengers, or other individuals working on or using railways or railway premises:

(b) regulate all traffic and all classes of traffic, and prohibit traffic or a class of traffic, either absolutely or conditionally, on railways:

(c) set out standards and requirements concerning the use of safety equipment by rail personnel, passengers, or other individuals working on or using railways or railway premises. [emphasis added]

This law means that the Minister may, without consulting anyone else, make a rule requiring you to hop on one foot and wear a pink gorilla suit when in a train station or riding in a train. “Your” rail network? I think not. The state has all the powers that only a landowner should have [2], therefore I conclude that the state is the de facto owner.

Here’s another example: in Australia the state requires people to pay for a permit if they’re going to take photographs in a National Park and may use those photographs commercially [3]. Do you still think that National Parks are public property, owned by all?

What’s the agenda behind this?

The agenda is the Socialist/Communist desire to disempower you by taking away your property/property rights. In the Communist Manifest Marx and Engels laid out ten steps for the transition from communism to socialism. Here’s four of those steps:

1) Abolition of property in land [outlawing private ownership of land] and application of all rents of land to public purposes.

3) Abolition of all rights of inheritance [when you die your property is stolen by the state: death taxes are a partial step towards this].

4) Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels [presumably this blog makes me a rebel in the eyes of the state, and you’re reading it so you’re a rebel by association].

6) Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.

2. If I visit your house you are perfectly entitled to set down conditions of entry, including a requirement that I wear a pink gorilla suit and hop on one foot. That’s part of your property rights; it’s also a great way to avoid having unwelcome guests. Every landowner has conditions of entry: do you willingly let gun-toting burglars enter your home?

In my earlier post titled Cellphones aren’t allowed while driving, you naughty children I slammed the recent law which made driving while using a cellphone illegal and proposed a better alternative. Now, there’s an article in the NZ Herald which supports my contention that there is no need for yet another law in this police state which tries to drown us in a stinking swamp of legislation.

A Dunedin woman who was too busy texting her friends to notice the patrol car following her has been charged with dangerous driving.

The 25-year-old, who was returning from a trip to Naseby, was spotted by members of the public crossing the centre line on State Highway 1 between Waikouaiti and Dunedin, Senior Sergeant Mel Aitken said.

She was also alleged to have reached speeds up to 140km/h, Ms Aitken said. A marked patrol car followed the woman, with the officer observing her car crossing the centre line and exceeding the speed limit.

The driver was pulled over before Pine Hill where she admitted she had been texting a friend. She is to appear in the Dunedin District Court this month on the dangerous driving charge.

I simply cannot see any need for a ban on using a cellphone whilst driving when there are already laws that cover the results of doing such a thing in a dangerous manner.

Can you see what is happening here? Instead of merely wanting to punish wrongdoing (as in the case of the woman above [1]), the state is wanting to prevent wrongdoing, by making the use of cellphones whilst driving illegal. The only way to prevent wrongdoing is to take away the freedom of people by putting up fences around them and that, in my humble opinion, is unadulterated evil. When Big Brother and Nanny State start copulating we get cops controlling what you and I do in the course of our daily lives.

I believe that talking and texting while driving is dangerous and inconsiderate of others, but I do object to making it illegal.

Please read my earlier post in order to see a better way of dealing with people who use cellphones whilst driving.

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1. I would not classify what this woman did as wrongdoing because she did not breach the non-aggression axiom. I would classify what she did as stupid and inconsiderate of others in the extreme (I’m not saying that she’s stupid – I’m saying that she did a stupid thing).

A free Christmas play for Wellington children in Child Youth and Family care contained swear words and sexual references.

Together with their foster parents, the 140 children, the youngest of whom was six, watched the entire opening night of ‘An Adagio Christmas’ at Wellington’s Downstage Theatre.

The play contains the use of the “f” word and one character spoke of losing her virginity and mimed a slapstick orgasm.

However, Ray Smith from Child Youth and Family says despite the suggestive themes, the children loved the show.

“I watched some of the little faces during the course of the show and the little kids were on the edge of their seats wondering if the wonderful acrobats were going to fall off their chairs and poles,” Mr Smith said.

Mr Smith hopes the children will look back and remember how much they enjoyed the outing.

So, this is what happens when children are taken into state ‘care’, including those children who are taken from good parents on nothing more than a suspicion of smacking.

Let’s imagine that a family came under scrutiny from Child Youth and Family, and CYF found out that the parents had sent their children to such a play. Would CYF say “Well done, good parents”, or would CYF say “Highly inappropriate, you bad parents”, take the children from the family home, and send them for sexual abuse counselling?

It’s always the same with the government: do what we say, not what we do.

After showing how the various referenda with strong results have been ignored, Bob says

I want NZ to be a place of DEMOCRACY not DICTATORSHIP

I do not wish to criticise Bob in any way, but apparently he, like 99.99% of people, does not realise that democracy is dictatorship by the majority. Allow me to explain.

87.4% of a representative sample of the population have voted against the anti-smacking law. If they have their way and the anti-smacking law is repealed (or amended) then that 87.4% of the population will be imposing their will upon the 12.6% of the population who want the anti-smacking law retained as it is. That is dictatorship by the majority.

Presently the government is in favour of retaining the anti-smacking law without changes, so it is ignoring what is commonly called the will of the people. That is dictatorship by the minority, i.e. the 122 politicians in parliament who think that they know best.

My point is this: democracy is always a dictatorship. The real question today is this: which dictator will decide what happens to the anti-smacking law? Presently Mr Minority (the government) is deciding. I believe that it is a lesser evil when Mr Majority (the 87.4%) decides what happens to the anti-smacking law, and that is why I will be marching on Saturday.

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Have you ever wondered why this country is a mess and why we always have dishonest politicians? When you realise which majority is ruling NZ and appointing the politicians it will all make sense. The answers are in my post The problem with democracy – Part One.

The police state has slain another freedom: now talking on a hand held cellphone whilst driving is illegal [1]. This is from the NZ Herald:

For frontline road police such as Sergeant Ashley Gore, the ban on using hand-held phones while driving could not have come soon enough.

“We have been waiting for the cellphone ban to come in because we have seen a lot of bad driving and so many near-misses,”

Naturally the policeman and the NZ Herald trumpet the party line, whilst ignoring the fact that talking on a hands free phone while driving is about as dangerous as talking on a hand held one.

The NZ Herald goes on to say

Even before the ban, police were able to charge motorists caught driving erratically while on the phone with careless use of a motor vehicle.

Great, so now if you drive erratically whilst talking on a hand held cellphone you can be prosecuted for two offences instead of just one [2]. That’s like having state executions where they shoot people twice in the head despite the fact that once would suffice.

The cop’s statement typifies the attitude of those people who rule this country:

We have been waiting for the cellphone ban to come in because we have seen a lot of bad driving and so many near-misses

The key phrase there is “near misses”. Most of the time people manage to talk on a cellphone without causing any problems, but the state punishes the majority in order to ‘protect’ them from the minority [3]. Again and again our masters see something that causes occasional problems and they decide that it must be made illegal in order to maintain social order and justify their parasitic careers. It Is Important To Be Seen To Be Doing Something is their motto. It’s the same with the anti-smacking law: a tiny minority of people beat their children to a pulp so giving a swat on the rump steak was made illegal for everyone [4].

Here’s a better way. Talking on a cellphone while driving doesn’t violate the non-aggression axiom, so make it legal. At the same time, bring in restorative justice so that those who damage person and/or property as a result of driving whilst talking on a cellphone bear the full cost of the consequences of their actions, including medical care for the injured [5]. At present the cost of medical care for the injured is borne by every taxpayer, so offenders are shielded from the consequences of their actions. When people see what the potential cost of driving whilst talking on a cellphone is – far, far greater than a $80 fine – the sensible ones will stop the practice. The foolish ones will continue their habits no matter what system is in place, but at least with my plan they will receive a huge and just self-inflicted punishment rather than a paltry $80 fine from the state.

Making people bear the full cost of the consequences of their actions is a fair and just way of reducing the dangerous practice of driving whilst talking on a cellphone. It is also consistent with the laws of nature: when a child puts his hand on a hot stove the pain teaches him to stay away from hot stoves.

1. Arguably it’s not a slaying of a freedom, but rather a removal of a permission. Experience shows that any ‘freedom’ we have only exists because the state allows it to exist. If you have trouble believing this, consider the fact that the state can take your house and property at any time, it can take your children if abuse is even suspected, it can force medical treatment upon you and your children, it controls what you put into your body, and it can take as much of your money as it wants to. New Zealanders have no legal means with which to to control the government, therefore the government is the de facto absolute ruler over them. You are a vassal, a pawn controlled by the state.

2. You can also be prosecuted if the phone is not ‘secured in a mounting fixed to the vehicle’. That’s right, you can’t put the phone on the seat beside you and use a hands free kit. For the full details see clause 23 here (PDF 96KB). The plain-English version (it’s as close to plain English as a bureaucrat can get) is here.

3. Who needs enemies when they have friends like that? The ban on using cellphones whilst driving is fundamentally a violation of property rights, i.e. it violates your right to do whatever you like with your property unless you violate the non-aggression axiom in the process. Think about it: Nanny State (Big Brother’s sister) is sitting in the back seat of your car and telling you that you cannot pick up the cellphone that you own.

4. That was one of the publicly stated motivations for the anti-smacking law. Here’s my version: our masters believe that smacking is wrong so they force everyone to parent as they do. This action arises from their conviction that every child is the dominion of that state not the dominion of their parents (as shown by the fact that parents must get permission from the state before they can home school their children). See footnote 1.

5. If someone is killed the offender should provide for that person’s dependents, providing what the deceased would have otherwise provided. At present every taxpayer bears the cost of providing for the dependents (via the welfare system) and therefore the offender is shielded from the consequences of his actions.